It was an underwhelming season finale when compared to what happened on The Flash last night that I was really hoping that what happened there would reverberate into Arrow. Alas no.

Island Flashback

Let’s keep this short. Taiana and Rieter fight. Before hand, Rieter takes down the getaway plane. Rieter tries to take the life force out of Taiana but it weakens him that lets Oliver kill him. Taiana feels the darkness of the idol overtake her and begs Oliver to kill her but not before assuring that Oliver will keep his promise to go to Russia on her behalf. Oliver says he will and then snaps her neck. The island prisoners hold Oliver at gunpoint and Oliver has to explain what happened to Taiana and what Rieter did. Oliver then tells the prisoners he has a way off the island and that is via Amanda Waller and her ARGUS helicopters. Amanda takes the idol and verthing that Rieter brought with him on the islands. Waller gives back Oliver his crate that has Yao Fei’s bow and arrow, his hood and Oliver’s dad’s notebook. Waller tries to recruit Oliver but he says he needs to honor a promise first.

So we know that season 5’s flashbacks involve him going to Russia, getting his Bratva tattoo and learning Russian. Season 5’s flashbacks will probably end with him being back on the island and looking like how he did in the Pilot.

Darhkness Falls

We pick up exactly where we left off. Darhk is threatening Felicity to get her to help restart Rubicon. Curtis tries to play hero but Darhk just knocks him out. Then Darhk starts to threatening Felicity’s mom and starts to suck the life force out of her. But the Green Arrow and Spartan arrive. Donna is safe. Nothing the Green Arrow does can stop Darhk and when he starts to suck Oliver’s life force out, we see that he cannot stop it. It is only Speedy’s threats against Darhk’s daughter that gets him to stand down. Felicity notices that her laptop is missing and it is the one that can re-start Rubicon.

Curtis is brought into the Arrow Cave but he is going to be okay as he only suffered a few bruised ribs. At her terminal, Felicity notices that Rubicon is back online and over 15,000 nuclear warheads have been activated. The world has 2 hours before it is destroyed. But Star City has 45 minutes as one warhead is coming its way. Felicity gets Lance to take her mom out of town and into safety. And little Sara is safe in Coast City.

Unfortunately for the Arrow Cave, a whole bunch of ghosts invade it. Team Arrow with an assist from Malcolm manage to take them out. When Diggle hesitates to kill one, Lyla has to take the kill shot and this gets him to admit to her what really happened to Andy.

While cleaning up, Oliver and Felicity wonder what Laurel would have made of everything that is happening. Felicity doesn’t want Oliver to blame himself for her death or even what is happening with Darhk. There are news reports of looting in Star City and Curtis talks to Oliver about how the Green Arrow inspired him to want to stay in Star City. After speaking to Curtis, this spurs Oliver to go downtown and give a speech to the masses. It is basically about how the citizens of Star City are resilient after surviving all the crap they went through for the past three seasons and they will survive this too. Oliver inspires hope in the people of Star City. Also, Curtis and Felicity figure out a way to stop the warhead heading to Star City. Felicity then gives Lyla the code on how to stop the other 15,000 warheads.

The team find the location of Cooper so Speedy, Malcolm, Curtis and Felicity goes after him. After taking down Ghosts, Felicity finds Cooper who has been shot. Darhk is controlling the bullet’s movement in him and will kill him if Cooper stops Rubicon. Felicity manages to convince Cooper to be the man that she loved back in college, the one that wanted to save the world. Cooper stops but Darhk, good on his word, kills him. Felicity and Curtis then figure out a way to get all 15,000 nuclears missiles to blow up in space.

Meanwhile, Oliver as Green Arrow goes after Darhk. Their fight moves from his underground hideout to the streets of Star City.

The people of Star City stand behind the Green Arrow and offer their support and this hope seems to depower Darhk allowing Oliver to cut him with an arrow. Lance comes back and so does Lyla and Diggle. The three of them and the people of Star City confront the ghosts while Oliver grabs an arrow and kills Darhk the same way Laurel was killed.

Back at the Arrow Cave, Lance announces that he is no longer suspended but he no longer wants to be a cop so he and Donna are leaving town for a bit. Thea too is leaving town as she needs to know who she is and if she wants to be part of Team Arrow. Diggle leaves town too as he needs to find himself again after what happened to Andy. We see Diggle has re-enlisted and Lyla doesn’t look happy.

Oliver visits Laurel grave hoping she understands why he killed Darhk. Felicity arrives and explains to Oliver that he didn’t spread his darkness nor does he have it still but what he is feeling is a schism.

Oliver gets a phone call from a city councilor pretty much asking him to be interim mayor until an election in August. Oliver is sworn in and we can expect him to be mayor come the season premiere.

Season 4 ends with pretty much all of Team Arrow dispersed except for Felicity who swears not to leave his side. Things look promising for season 5 unless we get a timeline reboot after what Barry did in The Flash.